A landing gear assembly of a large commercial aircraft may include a plurality of wheel and brake assemblies under the aircraft's nose and wings. Each wheel and brake assembly may include a wheel, rotor discs that rotate with the wheel, and stator discs that are fixed against rotation with respect to a brake head or housing. A brake rod, which may be connected to the brake head and to a landing strut, prevents rotation of the brake head during braking.
During braking, loads on the brake rods are measured. The measured loads are used to determine braking force.
The load on each brake rod may be measured by a strain gage. A strain gage such as a Wheatstone bridge includes multiple elements, which are mounted with precision on each brake rod. After the elements have been mounted, thin gage wires are soldered onto the elements.
Several hours may be spent building a Wheatstone bridge on a single brake rod. In a large commercial aircraft, there might be as many as sixteen brake rods.
It would be desirable to reduce the time to build a Wheatstone bridge on a brake rod.